


"The Still Point..."

by SolivagantSleepyhead



Category: Homestuck
Genre: F/F, M/M, School Reunion, T.S. Eliot poems haha, hating your hometown like every good musician, some pretty blatant romanticizing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-06-23
Updated: 2014-06-24
Packaged: 2018-02-05 21:25:42
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 4,591
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1832803
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SolivagantSleepyhead/pseuds/SolivagantSleepyhead
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Ghosts of the past usually come back to haunt us, whether brought on by our senses, memories, or events.</p>
<p>Cronus Ampora never wanted to come back to this town, where things are frozen in time and he feels like he's choking. He never wanted to come back and see these people, but he did. And he's in too deep. He delved too far into his regrets and ended up blithely handing his heart to an auburn haired memory he only now just remembered. </p>
<p>You can't go back in time and alter events, but there is always an opportunity to atone for mistakes and make the future your own.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Sorry, I;m trash. sorry.  
> (Also FILWYUS readers, please read the end notes)

You'd never been one to be easily swayed by nostalgia. High school hadn’t exactly been the “golden years” that you had been told to expect, and what you could remember for the most part was obfuscated by your own personal haze of teen angst and sexual frustration. Overall, you didn't really see any point to making the 5 hour journey to your small home-town just to spend your night in the muggy, sweaty gymnasium of a school you hated with a couple hundred people who couldn't give a shit about you. The last thing you wanted was to be stuck sitting around for 4 hours while former classmates flitted around to each other crying and talking about their stupid fucking kids and stupid fucking spouses like anyone actually cared about how they had spent the last decade. In fact, you’d rather tear off your own dick and fuck yourself with it than waste a perfectly good Saturday night in that shitty situation.

Obviously, you had immediately checked off a definite ‘no’ when the e-vite had made its way into your email. You put it out of mind pretty quickly, as there wasn’t anything worth dwelling on in the whole scene of irritating and expected pleasantries. Yet, when an email arrived a week later from an address you didn’t recognize, you hadn’t expected the two events to be related at all.

Dear Cronus; 

Hello! It has been quite a while since our last correspondence. Two years, if I am correct? As for the subject of this message: as you may recall, I was the Student Body President, and was therefore put in charge of organizing the upcoming 10-Year High School Reunion. However, I have yet to find any suitable music for the event, and I was wondering if you would be willing to perform, what with your recent success in the music industry. It would really make the event, I believe. 

Anyways, if your schedule permits, both Meenah and I think it would be fantastic if you could play a few songs for us all! Thank you for your time, and hopefully you will consider my proposition. 

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                       Yours Truly: Aranea Serket 

“Fuck…” You sighed, raking a hand through your messy hair as you rolled over in bed. There was no way Meenah would ever let you live it down if you ruined her wife’s plans, especially since you had basically been avoiding them since their wedding reception. It was just too much for you at the time, and you needed to get away from the past. But now was different. You had no more excuses to give them, and you kind of owed this one thing to them, after so many years.

Two weeks later, you found yourself begrudgingly loading up your car, absolutely dreading the next 5 hours alone with only your thoughts and the ceaseless irritation that only seemed to multiply with each mile you put between your apartment (where you should be) and your car (where you should NOT fucking be). The only thing that kept you sane was reminding yourself that it was one night, just one night to get through before you could fade back into your quiet existence hours away and far from your former-classmates’ small-town, white picket-fence, 2.5 children, quaint little neighborhood dreams.

…

After about 3 stops, 2 cigarettes and 15 minutes every other hour devoted to parking on the side of the road, shaking out the tension in your fingers and calculating how long it would take if you turned around that very second and went back, your eyes landed on the familiar sign welcoming you back to the town you were raised in all those years ago. You’d been gone since an hour after your high school graduation, and you thought you’d at least feel _something_ when the town came into view, but you were uncomfortably numb and foreign in this place you knew so well. If it hadn’t been for the fact that you could map the town out brick by brick with your eyes closed, you would have thought you were somewhere different entirely. The most terrifying thing was that it was exactly the same as when you left. No new boom of urbanization had occurred in your decade long absence, and you even realized with the slightest sense if horror that the breeze wafting in through your open window even _smelled_ the same as it had.

The school, as expected, looked exactly the same as when you spared it one last glance before peeling out of the student lot on that last day. Even the clusters of balloons announcing the occurrence of the reunion seemed like a passing memory of those heralding your departure on graduation day. You heaved another sigh of exhaustion just looking at it as you reluctantly grabbed your guitar from the back and made your way inside.

As soon as your feet hit the worn out, polished wood of the gymnasium floor, Aranea was bustling toward you, a large smile stretched across her face.

“Cronus, I am so relieved that you are here! We were beginning to think you wouldn’t make it in time!” She grinned, giving you a polite hug before waving Meenah over from where she had been conversing with her old team members. Meenah flashed you a smirk as well, excusing herself from her group as she approached the two of you.

“Hey Cron-ass, where you been hidin’, boy?” She chuckled, punching you in the shoulder lightly. “Haven’t seen your dumb ass in hella long, you ain’t even been callin’ any ‘o the other buoys from your old crew, neither, so I wasn’t actually plannin’ on you showin’ up here.”

You don’t really have a response to that, so you just laugh sarcastically, obvious in your disingenuity. _Great, another reason why you should have just stayed at home._

“Oh! Shoot, I need to get onstage to announce your act and introduce tonight’s main speaker. Let’s all catch up again later, alright?” Aranea smiled apologetically. “Cronus, you should probably come backstage too so you can prepare in a less hectic environment.”

You nodded, following her into the back room behind the stage as she set up the microphone. Honestly, you were glad to be away from everyone. You may have just arrived, but fuck if you weren’t more than ready to never see any of these motherfuckers again. You didn’t like the vast majority of your peers in high school, and you sure as fuck didn’t want anything to do with them now.

“Good Evening, class of 2004, are you all having a good time tonight?” Aranea asked, receiving a roar of applause in response. “As you may remember, I am Aranea Serket, your Class President 4 years running. And tonight, we have a pretty good lineup of your classmates to keep everyone entertained while you all reconnect with your peers and just have fun.”

“First off is someone I think some of you might recall. Give it up for tonight’s main speaker—or, as you may remember him on this day 10 years ago—our valedictorian, Kankri Vantas!” Aranea smiled, casting her eyes onto the left wing of the stage in anticipation.

Your breath caught in your throat when you saw him. _Kankri_. _How could you have ever let yourself forget about_ _Kankri_.

He’d changed so much. Soft, baby-smooth features had chiseled into hardened edges, forming sharp contours to the skin of his face. He had visibly lost weight, the chubbiness of his youth almost non-existent. His trademark oversized sweater had been replaced by a bright red cardigan and a grey collared shirt, showing the soft curve of his hips as he quietly made his way to the center of the stage.

He cleared his throat quietly, adjusting the microphone down a little bit to his own height, a faint blush dusting his beautiful toffee skin. Even as he spoke, you couldn’t process a word past the elegant lilt of his voice. You sat there, entirely entranced by this boy—this Kankri Vantas.  

_Leave it up to him to be the one changing thing in a town of suspended animation._

“-nus. CRONUS!”

“Huh, what?” You stuttered, your trance broken as you felt Aranea’s hands on your arm, trying to pull you up off of the couch.

“It’s time for your performance!” She scolded you, handing you your guitar as she ushered you onto the stage.

You functioned on auto-pilot more than anything as you performed, your thoughts overtaken entirely by that boy, if you could even call him that, anymore. Personally, you’d never known him well. He’d been in all honors classes throughout high school, where you’d been putting in minimal effort just to bide your time until you could move out and be on your way, so you’d never been in his classes. But you’d noticed him. _Oh,_ had you noticed him. Everyone knew Kankri “the insufferable” Vantas, teacher’s pet, ‘most likely to succeed’, school laughingstock and eternal virgin.

You’d laughed along with their jokes, of course. It was a survival method more than anything. You’d laughed at the rumors haphazardly scrawled on bathroom walls, at him getting pushed into the pool, and even having his glasses broken at least three times a year (whether it be from getting shoved against lockers or them getting “accidentally” stepped on when he got “accidentally” knocked down, or even that one November day when he had “fallen” down a flight of stairs and broken his dominant arm). But you’d never shared with anyone the single conversation you had with him. The single conversation on the last day of junior year where you’d caught him lying under the bleachers on the cold concrete, smoking a single cigarette as he mumbled line after line of poetry to himself in the quiet of the sinking sun. The conversation where he’d convinced you that happiness was paramount, and you only needed to worry about yourself if you wanted to follow your dreams and actually live _your_ life. The conversation that had for so long been your raison d'être, but had been lost somewhere in the tumble of dreamless nights and a distance of 250 miles.

You finished your set as quickly as possible, mumbling a hurried ‘thanks’ as you practically ran off the stage and back into the crowd, searching for _him_. You pretend not to hear anyone who calls your name, scanning the mass of bodies for that auburn haired specter of a life barely recognizable as your own.

Then, you see him. Isolated in the back, he leans against a wall, silently observing with a cold, questioning gaze the people who once treated him so awfully for simply existing as who he was. He looks so much more exhausted than he had, and looking at him physically hurts some part of you deep in your chest that you never knew existed until this very instant in time. Looking at him is like staring into a mirror at every mistake you made and every single word that went unsaid. And, suddenly those times that you laughed at his expense don’t feel so much like innocent hazing as they used to; the memories burn your throat like acid, a thin sheen of perspiration from the humidity of the gymnasium and your cold gripping nervousness slips like electric waves down your spine, and you’re rooted to the spot.

He notices you staring after what feels like an eternity. You see the internal debate flicker behind his russet eyes as he averts his eyes, evidently attempting to ignore you yet failing miserably. That gives you the courage you need and you put one shaking leg in front of the other, willing your body toward him.

A minute of tense silence passes, the heavy noise of the crowd fading into nothing as you stare at him, as if seeing him for the very first time all over again.

“It’s, uh… been a while, huh?” You remark daftly, internally face-palming at your own ineloquence.

He huffs a bit in a small laugh, staring at the floor. “I suppose so. How are you, Cronus?”

“I’m fine, I guess.” You mumble absently, rubbing the back of your neck. “You’ve…changed.” You smirk awkwardly, wishing that the Lord Jesus would just lift you the fuck out of here to save you further embarrassment.

He averts his eyes again, fidgeting with his sleeves anxiously. “I grew up.” He chuckles softly, almost inaudibly. “I’m not the only one, though. Your performance was impressive.”

“Thanks, chief.” You smiled. A genuine, honest smile. ( _How long has it been?_ ) “Honestly, though, I kinda wish I hadn’t come back.”

He nods in understanding, a soft scowl on his face. “I know what you mean; I was dragged here by my best friend. I never wanted to relive high school.” He laughed bitterly, eyes filling with that cold indifference you remember so well.

You scan the crowd over your shoulder quickly, spotting Meenah, Aranea and a taller woman in a dark green gown all staring at the two of you inquisitively. Claustrophobia sets in on you quickly, and you suddenly become acutely aware of just how many people are stuffed into this too small room and you feel your lungs constricting again.

“Wanna get outta here?” You mutter quickly, panic slurring your words a bit as you stare back at the boy in front if you. He nods quickly, allowing you to pull him out the side door and into the tepid embrace of the evening air. The fresh summer breeze fills your lungs and you find yourself staring at the sky, the warmth of his hand in your own anchoring you to the here and now.

He looks at you inquisitively; the dim exterior lights of the gymnasium obscuring half of his small face as he processes your facial features. Then, slowly, he begins leading you further and further, until the booming of the music in inaudible, and only the sound of far off crickets remain.

You feel the cold metal of the bleachers beneath your fingertips like a bite of frost on a January day. He moves past you, sitting cross-legged beneath the stands as he did almost 11 years ago to the date and it rushes back to you in a flood of sensation. His glowing eyes fall upon yours again, and a phrase crashes into your mind, the only thing that feels natural.

“You’re the still point in the turning world.” And you’ve never been so sure of anything in your life. He’s change in a town that is permanently stuck on repeat. He’s the grounding force right here, right now. He’s the reason you left this town. He’s the reason you _came back._

He seems taken aback for a moment, his eyes going wide as he regards you.

“…you remembered.” He whispers, his voice filled with such a childish awe that you want to crush him against you. To apologize for being one of them. To say how sorry you are for forgetting in the first place. “T.S. Eliot: _Four Quartets_.” He smiles, and it’s so brilliant that you think you’re dying; you _must_ be because nothing in this town could become _that_.

Things could have been so different. He was _always_ there, why didn’t you realize it? How could you have not seen? Your heart feels like it could burst because you know that tomorrow you’ll be back in your apartment alone and he’ll be in his on the opposite end of this eternity, this shared superposition you’ve only just started discovering in his existence. You’ll go home and his name will mean nothing to you again and tonight will be another forgotten memory in the attic space of your minds.

You’re _terrified_.

You’re squeezing his hand like a life line, throat suddenly burning as your head starts to throb. He looks at you with his wide eyes, so unsure.

“I want to know you.” You blurt out, staring at him for something, anything to tell you that he wants the same, that you’re not shouting into the void or chasing a ghost that you never even realized had been haunting you all these years.

And, after what feels like the length of 10 lifetimes, he smiles, nods, and squeezes your hand back. “Of course.”

It swells in you softly, the nebulous feeling. This is here and now. You’ve fallen in love with this boy who is just like you in all the wrong ways. In fact, you think you probably loved him long ago. But this moment is your infinity, and it’s large and it’s impending, but you are not afraid, because his warm, small hand is in yours, and you’re seeing stars in his eyes.

The story is only just beginning.


	2. Da Capo

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The years of adolescence are so coveted for how exciting it is to see all of the world at one time, to be able to experience these beautiful sensations of love and hate for the first time ever is something that is never truly forgotten. These feelings lie latent inside of us all through our adult lives, fading, but never vanishing, not really.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ((Okay, so I hadn’t really planned on continuing this fic, but I found a random burst of inspiration late last night and thought that I might as well write a more detailed version of Kankri and Cronus’s first conversation—the important one. If you didn’t read the first part, it actually doesn’t matter, because these two are separated enough that you could treat them as two completely different things.))

_Da Capo:_

“Alright, Class; hand your exam papers forward with the answer booklet on top of the test booklet. Any scrap paper and note sheets can be recycled. Have a nice summer!”

You breathed a sigh of relief, crumpling your note sheet into your bag as you hefted it over your shoulder. 8 hours of exams every day for the past week had taken their toll on you, and all you really wanted was to pass out and have a cigarette for the first time today. But of _course_ you couldn’t do that. I mean, why would the universe let you have 5 fucking minutes of peace? No, you had to be next door at the elementary school in an hour for your kid brother’s 5 th grade graduation and it would take 50 goddamn minutes just to drive home and back, so you might as well just hang out here.

Luckily, 3 years’ experience with fucking around and avoiding responsibilities at school had made you something of a pro, and you knew basically every viable option for catching a bit of well-deserved shuteye on campus. You could practically feel the perpetually unlocked field shed beckoning you to unwind on the dated, worn-out mats, the siren call of your own indolence too much to resist.  

You meandered lazily through the corridors to the back entrance, fidgeting with your zippo within the confines of your pocket. The school was unusually deserted, all of those who often haunt the premises having disappeared into their respective hazes of post-exam exhaustion. The verdant turf of the football field was eerily quiet, absent of all the usual noise and excitement that sports season brings. Only the distant chirring crickets and soft hum of traffic betrayed the fact that the town still existed outside of that one moment—a separate infinity.

Inhaling deeply, you were shaken out of your evening reverie by a familiar carcinogenic scent, a definite shock from your lungs to the very core of your system. Smoking was forbidden on school grounds (not that simple prohibitions could rival teen rebellion) but it was still surprising to smell it so far out, especially when there wasn’t a soul left on campus—or, so you had thought. Glancing right, you could see the faintest of smoke trails rising from beneath the bleachers and into the technicolor sky, indicating the existence of another loner still lingering long after all others had gone. Your curiosity got the best of you, and you found yourself moving toward that small beacon of life before you could properly consider your actions. Crouching down to get a better view of the other, you couldn’t hold back a sharp gasp of surprise as you saw who it was.

His soft curls of dark auburn hair fanned out onto the dirty concrete beneath his head, long eyelashes casting gossamer shadows onto his tan, freckled cheeks. His lips moved softly, trails of smoke filtering through the open air as he formed verse after verse of poetry to no one but himself. Fingers curled around a single cigarette, he lay completely serene, and the quietest you had ever witnessed him. Evidently having heard your sharp intake of breath, his eyes opened sluggishly, unruffled as his gaze flickered to you. He made no effort to hide his violation of school rules (something absolutely unthinkable, coming from him), simply hefting himself up onto his elbows, straightening his eyeglasses to get a better look at you.

“Can I help you?” He asks, and you’re completely thrown off by the composure he has while: A) breaking school rules, B) technically breaking the state law, and C) having been caught talking to himself, completely alone underneath the school bleachers.

You stare at him dumbly for several moments, because _how the actual fuck do you respond? This kid who was more like a bad joke to you for 3 years is here and acting surprisingly real and what can you even say to him?_

“…Mind if I join ‘ya?” You inquire uncomfortably. _Smooth, Cronus. Really smooth_.

“I have no reason to oppose.” He replies simply, a conditioned indifference pervading his tone of voice.

You immediately sit beside him, almost mirroring his cross-legged position as he turns his body to face yours. Your fingers fumble in the pocket of your leather jacket, desperately trying to get a hold on your cigarettes and lighter while you do everything in your power to avoid Kankri’s calculating gaze.

Eventually, he seems to ease up, taking another drag from his cigarette as he returns his sights to the field surrounding the two of you. In the early evening sun, the golden light bathes him in an almost ethereal glow, a holy aura only occasionally pierced by the curling tendrils of smoke escaping his lips each time he exhales.  

“You’re graduating tomorrow, correct?”

You’re caught off guard by his voice, having been so lost in your thoughts that you’d almost entirely forgotten about him.

“Nah. Same grade as you, actually.” You reply, raising an eyebrow at him. Sure, you never really saw one another, but your class was only around 200 kids, you were sure he would have _heard_ of you, at the very least.

“Is that so? I apologize; I suppose you just seemed a lot older than I am.” He replied, closing his eyes once more. “Well, if you aren’t wandering around the school so late for nostalgia purposes, what brings you out at such an unusual time?”

“I was hoping to catch some z’s, y’know? My little bro is graduating soon and I thought it might be a little less horrible if I wasn’t half-dead.” You smiled, bringing your own cigarette to your lips as you followed his gaze past the far-off rows of poplar trees, rising into the pale sky like a jagged row of thorns. “What about you? Any reason you’re hanging around all alone?” _And acting so strangely, and smoking, and being so stereotypically un-Kankri?_

He scowls at nothing in particular, dropping his cigarette before grinding it into the ground with the toe of his shoe. “I needed some form of respite. My responsibilities are quite extensive, and sometimes I need to drop away and “Chill out”, for lack of a better term.”

“Yeah, you’re top ‘o the class, right? That must fuckin’ suck.”

He nods, his stare still bearing into the horizon line. “I sometimes think that the absolute worst thing that can happen is letting people develop high expectations of you.” He chuckles sardonically, capturing your eyes in his own for a brief moment.

“I kinda get what you mean. I mean, my dad has this huge company on the East Coast, or somethin’, and he wants me to take it over as his first-born son, or whatever…” You trail off, taking another drag of your cigarette to distract yourself from your quickly developing headache.

“That sounds like an auspicious opportunity, if you ask me.” He remarks bluntly, confused by your enmity. “But is that what you want for yourself?”

You reel back for a moment, cigarette dangling precariously from your lips as your mouth falls open. “No…” You mumble softly to yourself, perplexed by this boy. Your future wasn’t open for debate. This was our fate as the heir to the Ampora Company, so why is he treating it like you have some kind of a choice?

“How about this, then: what do you want to do?” He presses, and you just gape at him, eyebrows furrowed in confusion.

“I guess…I guess I want to be a musician?” You say tentatively after a few moments, unsure as to whether or not he could be joking.

He smiles, satisfied. “Then do that. It’s _your_ life.”

“Listen, I don’t think you really understand the situation. My old man’s been plannin’ on this since before I was even born.” You explain.

“But you don’t want that for yourself?”

“That’s not the point, I—” You groan, frustrated with how complicated he’s making this situation with his balanced voice and pointless rationalizations.

“I get the ‘point’—if you can even call it that. And what I understand from that is the fact that you feel obligated to do this for your father, despite the fact that you would be potentially sacrificing your own happiness to follow in his footsteps. And, while that is admirable of you, it is also very, very stupid.” He explains, staring you down with his auburn eyes. “A human life is not something that can be reclaimed once it is over. Although some religious texts may beg to differ, there is no proof that souls are actually immortal, and it would be foolish of you to waste your time here on earth desperately trying to appease others.”

You’re speechless. It hits you like a cold gust of wind, and you’re suddenly acutely aware of the fact that maybe he’s right? Maybe everything doesn’t have to be predetermined? You fall back, eyes wide as you gaze blankly into the evening sky.

“Fuck…” You mumble to yourself, feeling as though you’re actually seeing for the first time. Your daydreams don’t have to be small amusements, meant to pass time as you wait for the inevitable. There could be a future beyond what was thrust upon you. There could be a chance to make your way yourself instead of inheriting one. _It’s your life._

“Wow, I…thank you.” You whisper to him, in astonishment at the blooming feeling of hope in your chest.

“It’s really no problem.” He shrugs carelessly, as if he thought nothing of it. “I find solace in knowing that fact, and I thought you might benefit from it, too.”

Glancing up at him, you couldn’t help but smile. _Had you really spent all of these years misjudging him_?

“Just remember that the future can always be altered as one matures; don’t ever feel irresolubly trapped by others’ wishes of you. _‘At the still point of the turning world. Neither flesh nor fleshless; neither from nor towards; at the still point, there the dance is, but neither arrest nor movement. And do not call it fixity.’_ \- T.S. Eliot.” He smiled, pulling himself to his feet as he collected his backpack from where it had been resting against the stand.

You had followed his retreating form, mesmerized by his words as he moved across the field, eventually disappearing behind the chain-link fence surrounding the perimeter of the school.

You didn’t sleep that night, visions of an auburn haired apparition flitting through your mind as you lay restlessly in bed, drowning in the summer air that had grown heavy with humidity.

The next morning, you pulled your abandoned guitar out from its indefinite resting place in the back of the closet.

**Author's Note:**

> Okay, as you all probably noticed, i'm not updating Falling in love with your unlikely saviour, and i probably will not update again. Sorry.  
> I lost interest in the story, and every other plot i had seems vapid and half-assed, so i'm nipping this in the bud before it turns to total shit.  
> thank you so much for supporting me, it means so much.


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